Errol Morris and JFK's assassination

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On the 48th anniversary of JFK's assassination, Errol Morris posted a video interview with Josia Thompson, author of Six Seconds In Dallas. The discussion centers on The Umbrella Man, the star of quite a few conspiracy theories that were spawned on that tragic day at Dealey Plaza. "The Umbrella Man" (Thanks Scott Matthews and Hugh D'Andrade!)

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The JFK assassination was one of the first conspiracies that soured me to the idea of conspiracies in general. Occam’s Razor, and all that.

IIRC it was the Discovery channel that did a re-creation of the shot, all the same angles into super realistic ballistic gel (with fake organs, etc), using the same vintage rounds and rifle. They got their bullet to behave pretty much exactly as the one that killed Kennedy.

The umbrella man is a red herring.
I keep wondering why no one talks about how J. Edgar Hoover announced there was no conspiracy and Oswald had acted alone only minutes after. Even if he acted alone, wouldn’t there be an investigation before there would be that kind of certainty? It was a political statement and not a statement of fact.
Besides, several dozen people testified they heard a shot from behind the fence (btw the fence is still there and the spot where the shot came from still has a broken pale as if that spot is a memorial). An off duty sherrifs officer heard the shot, saw the puff of smoke, went to the fence and a man stepped out and displayed his secret service credentials. The secret service stated that everyone they had here in Dallas was in the motorcade. So, who was the man behind the fence?
Police rushed the book depository and two secret service men came out and displayed their credentials. Who were they?

The Umbrella Man was identified ages ago. He wasn’t the first to bring an umbrella to a JFK appearance to protest Joe Kennedy’s pro-Nazi stance when he was ambassador to England. The black furled umbrella, particularly back then, was a symbol of the tight assed conservative British foreign service and bureaucracy which was crammed with those who thought England could do business as usual with Hitler.